


The Immaculate Dissection

by diabhals



Category: Beneath - Fandom, Original Work
Genre: Body Horror, Character Study, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Sickfic, by that i mean vall is a creepy creepy bab, dissection equals love, i guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:07:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23945182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diabhals/pseuds/diabhals
Summary: Meditations on a theme of beauty, aka creepy boyfriend pining for sexy boyfriend.
Relationships: Tammy Ciobanu/Valleri Apostol
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	The Immaculate Dissection

Up here, Vall can see why it’s called _whaler’s sickness_ . Tammy’s room is no ship, but the city fog outside smells as salty as its cousin from the sea; it might be more accurate to call them conjoined twins, the harbour only a few streets away. They share a heart, the same icy drizzle flowing like blood through their veins. The same seagulls screeching outside the window. The same _loneliness_ , though up here it feels less cathartic than he remembers it. More dangerous, as if the fog _knows_ they won’t be able to seek aid on its blue-swathed streets.

The sailors call it a curse, revenge of the whales. Vall’s working hypothesis is that Tammy must’ve slept with one of those whalermen, but it sickens his stomach to think of it, a flimsy sixteen-year-old malleable under huge, callused hands. Sometimes he constructs alternative hypotheses, alternative realities in which Tammy’s quick fingers work drawing maps of the North Sea, in which he has a shawl drawn about his shoulders as he sits on the bowsprit of a boat, outward bound for a different kind of sea mist. None of Vall’s possibilities are realities, though; what is a reality is the uncomfortable velvet pouffe he’s been forced to fold himself onto, keeping vigil at Tammy’s bedside.

If anyone found him here -- Vall’s stomach lurches, he’s so far away from the security of the cellar, no darkness to hide in, for all he knows, Galatea has guards standing outside to arrest him as soon as he leaves. _Leaving_ itself had been a mistake, he sees that now. Yet he can’t stomach the thought of _staying_ , either, even without a sabre at his neck he would’ve come. It only took three words, after all:

_Tammy’s going to die_.

Glancing down, Vall satisfies himself that _death_ isn’t a possibility anymore. Tammy’s red hair is spilled out across the pillows like a splash of entrails, lips parted to drag in laboured breaths, but they’ve managed to bring his fever down until the only evidence is a bloodstain-flush across his cheeks. No more body-rending coughing fits, no more fever-nightmares, just _sleep_ , the Goddess knows Tammy needs it.

Perhaps Vall should be guilty for his disappointment. There’s excuses for it, loopholes Bea tosses at him to give him a way to save himself from her disgust: that seeing Tammy fight for his life over and over, pyrrhic victory after gasping-breathed pyrrhic victory, was more than Vall could bear, but that wasn’t true. Watching Tammy fight, tooth and nail in a way he never would over anything else, only makes Vall fall further in love, filled with more admiration than his heart can handle. Yet -- the disappointment is still there, nestled under his collarbone, the missed opportunity curled into his fingers like a scalpel.

He can’t. He _mustn’t_ ; Galatea makes no secret of what she things of him, what her sword thinks of him, and she’s still there, passed out in an armchair, jacket undone.

 _Asleep_ , but if she wakes she’ll _know_ \--

It’s an addiction, watching Tammy, and he’s just as much a slave to it as Matei is to the bottle. As Kit is to fighting other people’s battles; Vall finds his eyes drifting back to that pallid face, reaching out to brush a single curl from Tammy’s sweat-sheened forehead.

How would he do it? With a scalpel, of course, in his cellar; Tammy’s presence would bring just as much light to it as he does living, loudly complaining if he gets any gore on his waistcoat. Vall’s finger dips down, tracing down neck, collarbones, feeling a fluttering pulse, as frantic as the wingbeats of a trapped bird. Still clinging to life, breath catching in a sleepy moan.

In his mind’s eye, Vall’s finger is as much of a scalpel as it’s always been, making the y-shaped incision. In his mind’s eye, Tammy’s veins are coated in nacre, his trachea spills pearls as the blade dips into it. Moving outward, his heart is full of necklaces, gilded chains coiled in atrium and ventricle; Vall lets them slip through his fingers, dropping them into a prepared jar, _plink plink plink_ . A pre-prepared label, date, time and specimen recorded, with one significant notation: _pure beauty_. 

Turning to the rest of the chest cavity, he finds the lungs full of sea-fog, city-fog, seeping through his fingers as they sink into spongy tissue. Lungs are shrouded in ribs, _whalebone_ , scrimshawed with flowers. The tiny blooms prick Vall with a sudden realisation: these are Tammy’s doing, these roses and sprays of baby’s breath, he can count in bouquets the times he’s sat by this self-same bedside. Tammy’s joints might be ringed and crushed by thick sail-rope, his spine may be colonised by coral and sea urchins, but he still _tries_ to make this broken body his own.

A sleep-groggy groan drags him back to reality; for a brief, terrified moment, Vall glances at Galatea, but she’s still sound asleep.

Feeling a clammy hand slip into his, he looks down again, only to be greeted by Tammy’s tired smile.

“You don’t need to pretend you’re not looking, sweetheart,” he says, voice barely more than a rasping whisper. Then, tacked on with something that could be approaching mischief: “Am I _really_ that hideous?”

So he hasn’t lost the ability to be utterly infuriating, then. Vall only deigns to respond with a shake of his head, not wanting to detangle his fingers from Tammy’s; the pressure sends sparks of pleasure flitting up his arm. 

Tammy only sighs, pouting slightly. He can barely keep his eyes open, but Vall knows he won’t even countenance going back to sleep unless he’s been sufficiently mollified. 

“You’re an insufferable prat,” he signs, though it’s accompanied by the head-tilt that means he doesn’t really mean it. “But you’re _radiant_ .” Leaning down, he plants a shy kiss on Tammy’s forehead. It _tastes_ of sea-salt, still too warm for comfort, and outside gulls seem to scream all the louder.

Inside, though, Tammy’s finally smiling again, nuzzling back into the pile of pillows. He’s ready to surrender to sleep again, Vall can tell in his settled breathing, but he’s still trying to keep his eyes open.

If Vall could dissect Tammy’s personality, strip it apart like he’s done with countless bodies, he’s sure of what he’d find. Despite the silks, despite the pearls, despite the flowers on the windowsill that Galatea’s dutifully replaced each morning, he’s certain Tammy’s soul would welded and bolted like a greatship’s hull. That it would be strung with iron cables, hammered out into sheets of metal, stoked by unquenchable fire. He’s a dock boy after all, for all his father keeps him caged up here with only the gulls for company, and Vall realises -- that’s what he loves. The indomitable, _impossible_ , sea-salt man, who might as well have been a whaler, for all his stubbornness.

  
 _His_ impossible man, his impossible love, who’s currently succumbing to sleep.


End file.
